Happy Holidays!
by Ariza Luca
Summary: Valentine's Day, Easter, Halloween, Christmas... there are a lot of holidays, aren't there? Welp, I guess the gang is going to start celebrating them all. FIRST CHAPTER - Happy Valentine's Day to my wonderful boyfriend!


**Happy Valentine's Day to my lovely boyfriend Toni42! (By the way, if y'all are sick and tired of us talking about it, I apologize xD)**

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"Oh shut up!"

Ivor's usually pale face was emulating a tomato as he whacked the ginger architect on the arm, making Soren burst into hearty laughter. "Well, you two _do_ act like a married couple."

"We do not!" Ivor was usually very much in control of his tongue, if not a very good public speaker, so it was actually incredibly funny watching him stammer horribly as he tried to defend himself.

"You really do, Ivor," Gabriel contributed, smiling all-too-cheerfully at Ivor. Honestly, Ivor was tempted to throw a Potion of Muteness at his friends at this point. See if they kept smiling at him like that.

"Well, Magnus and Ellegaard act like an old married couple, and you don't tease _them_ about it," Ivor switched tack at the speed of light.

"Oi!" The master of mayhem glared at his old friend from where he had an arm around Ellegaard, the brown-haired woman adjusting her curly hair slightly so that it hid the faint flush on her cheeks at the jibe.

It had taken several minutes to convince everyone to wear more casual clothing and not their full-on armor. Magnus was wearing his green suit, Ellegaard was wearing her brown suit, and together they looked like a very-sparsely-decorated Christmas Tree. Soren wore a gray suit with a brown vest over it, and Gabriel was wearing a blue shirt and dark pants.

He would've looked weird in a suit.

Ivor, having long since abandoned his old armor, just came in his usual robes. And he brought Harper.

Which, even though he frankly loved the woman– not that he was going to admit it to the others _quite_ yet– he was starting to regret, because the moment Soren and Harper had exchanged greetings and the Old Builder had headed to the restroom, his old friends had started mercilessly teasing him.

"Well, they acted like an old married couple long before they actually got together, so there wasn't any point," Gabriel replied with a shrug.

" _Hey!_ " Ivor relished the annoyed expression on Magnus's face and the flustered blush on Ellegaard's. See how they liked being on the receiving end of the teasing.

"I see you five are getting along splendidly."

Ivor's expression relaxed, and he turned to see Jessi, her curtain of black hair hanging to her waist and her green eyes gleaming with amusement. The gold pin that was usually tasked keeping her hair out of her face was replaced with a pink one in the shape of a heart. She'd kept the white t-shirt with the red sleeves, but had switched out the overalls for a purplish pair that fit the whole 'Valentine's Day' theme. "Oh– hello, Jessi. How's _your_ date going?"

Jessi grinned and rolled her eyes. "It's not a date, Dad–" She'd slipped into the habit of calling Ivor her dad a while back and everyone had just kind of gone with it– "It's a 'getting over our rivalry meeting'." She paused as she thought about it. "The tenth one we've had total."

The potionologist arched his eyebrow, doing his best to keep from grinning. "Even though you're meeting on Valentine's Day."

"Yes, and she changed her clothes."

"And she even changed her llama's scarf," Ivor noted, glancing at the fluffy creamy llama who, true to his comment, was currently wearing a white, pink, and red-striped scarf around her neck. Stella, who was seated next to Lluna, was stroking the llama's fur with a small smile. Her clothing was more casual than usual– instead of a full-out skirt-suit, she had on a pastel pink blouse and dark purple jeans.

"Exactly, perfect atmosphere for a getting-over-our-rivalry meeting," Jessi replied cheerfully and without skipping a beat. "It was nice of Radar to set up this whole area as a couples area."

"Does _he_ have someone to hang around in here with?" Ivor asked, drily.

Jessi squinted as she considered this. "I think he's mostly just hiding from the many girls who wish to date him in here. Oh– he did ask Binta to come with him just so that they'd leave him alone."

"Did he really?" Jesse, his dark brown hair dripping into his eyes slightly as he leaned over, joined the conversation without any preamble. It was a credit to how many times he'd done that before that nobody jumped or got startled by it. His dark eyes sparkled with interest.

"He did indeed," Jessi replied to her brother (cousin? Nobody was really sure how the two were related) with a small smile, "although it was definitely just to stave off the fangirls, since Radar has just been running around helping out around the area for the entire event so far."

Jesse raised his eyes to the ceiling. "Sounds just like the kid, honestly."

"Yeah, pretty much."

"Lukas and Petra definitely seem to be having fun over in their corner," Soren nodded at the far corner of the room. Petra and Lukas were seated in a booth across from each other and talking animatedly, Petra smothering laughter with one hand and gripping the table with the other to try to keep herself from exploding into laughter. Lukas was grinning as he waved his hands about in the air.

"Yeah, they definitely needed to catch up," Jessi agreed absentmindedly as she glanced over her shoulder at the couple.

"Are they not dating?" Gabriel asked, smiling and raising one eyebrow at the petite girl. Even with all five members of the Old Order of the Stone seated, she was still at about eye-level with them.

Jessi shrugged. "Oh, I have no idea about that. For all I know they're just catching up with each other."

"Who're the other couples in here, anyways? I don't see that many," Jesse mused as he looked around the area.

"Well, you and Nell," Jessi said, a teasing grin coming over her face.

Jesse's cheeks flushed slightly, but he smoothly responded, "Okay, well, she asked if we wanted to hang out and I figured it'd be nice to come here and hang out with all you nice folks."

"Yeah, brah, it's been nice listening to the Order of the Stone dudes argue back and forth like a bunch of married couples," Nell said cheerfully, ignoring the way the five members of the Old Order spun to face Nell, spluttering in indignation.

Jessi grinned at Jesse, the smile simply widening. "Nice answer. Anyway, the other couples are... Axel and Olivia, though I think they're just hanging out with each other, so I don't know if that counts– um, Aiden and Cassie–"

"Wait, Aiden and Cassie?"

"Don't interrupt," Jessi chided, but she was grinning so much that it didn't look like she was actually that annoyed. "Yes, Aiden and Cassie. They actually get along quite nicely when they're in the same room."

She could tell that Ivor was about to ask more, so she simply blazed along, "I think Milo and Isa showed up together, Maya and Gill are somewhere off in this room, Hadrian and Mevia showed up together but I don't know if they're actually _together_ together, uh, Romeo and Xara came in together but I haven't seen 'em since..."

"Wait, I thought Xara couldn't stand Romeo?" Soren asked, arching one eyebrow in confusion.

"It's not that she can't stand him, more that she's really angry at him," Jessi waved it away. "Besides, it's less of a Valentine's Day celebration than a... sort of commemoration event for Fred."

Soren's mouth moved into a perfect 'o' shape, and he nodded wordlessly at that.

Jessi quickly resumed the list. "And... actually, I think I should probably point out, there is one couple that we don't know. They're over there," and she gestured at a girl and a boy sitting in a corner.

The girl had short black hair that teetered over her face with a pink bang, bright pink eyes flashing out from her pale face. Said face was contrasted with a dark gray jacket, a darker pink shirt, and dark jeans. The boy, in contrast, wore a pure black hoodie with white-and-rainbow striped sleeves. His hair was short and cropped, and he had on a pair of glasses on a slightly almost feminine face. The couple were sitting and facing each other, and periodically both would start laughing.

"For that matter, how did you two get in the couple's group?" Ivor suddenly wondered, having realized something and looking over at Soren and Gabriel. "As far as I know, you two aren't dating anybody."

Gabriel proceeded, to Ivor's wicked delight, to turn a shade of red that was only rivaled by Jessi's sleeves as he started incoherently stammering. Since Gabriel had been one of the better public speakers within the group, it was quite funny when he got tongue-tied.

Soren, for his part, looked slightly embarrassed himself.

"Ooh, I sense a juicy story. Spill," Magnus said eagerly, looking all too eager to embarrass the usually impassive Gabriel and Soren after they'd just embarrassed him.

"Hey, Jessi. Jace," Radar exclaimed, popping over. Since Jessi and Jesse sounded nearly the same, he'd taken to calling the boy 'Jace' whenever the girl was present. Jesse had been confused initially, but had quickly adapted to the name. "What's up?"

"Oh, hey, Radar. Ivor was wondering how Soren and Gabriel got into this area since they're not a couple," Jessi replied blissfully, ignoring the fact that Soren and Gabriel were now turning so red that they could've been mistaken for tomatoes. Ivor could see the mischievous twinkle in her eye, though.

Good girl.

Radar blinked innocently. "Aren't they dating?"

Magnus let out a bellow of laughter and toppled off the bench, his arm slipping off from where it had been around Ellie as he fell over, completely losing his crap at that comment. Ellegaard didn't seem to mind either, one hand clamped over her mouth as she muffled near hysterical giggles, one hand gripping the table to keep herself from following Magnus's example. Ivor, for once, was laughing openly and loudly at that. Poor Gabriel and Soren were now easily the color of cherries.

Jesse quickly turned back to Nell and struck up a conversation with her, but the giant grin on his face gave him away. Nell was grinning as well, and even Jessi, the master of deadpan looks and silence, was giving Gabriel and Soren a faintly wicked smirk. Even Radar was giggling now, his cheeks slightly pink at his slight mistake earlier but, okay, their reactions were _funny_.

Harper chose right then to return to the table. "Hello, Jessi. Hello, Nell and Jace–" She had also adopted Radar's habit. "Hello, Radar." Without even blinking at the laughter around her, she slid back into her seat next to Ivor and gave a small smile in Ivor's direction. "You all teasing Soren and Gabriel?"

"Yep," Jessi replied easily and without even the smallest iota of embarrassment in her voice.

"Good, Soren was extremely hard to tease back when he was with us. This is far overdue."

" _Harper!_ "

Jessi finally let out a little laugh at Soren's horribly embarrassed face at that. "Well, actually, another question since you're here, Radar..."

"Mmhm?"

"Who's the couple in the corner?"

Radar followed Jessi's vague gesture, and his smile grew a little. "Oh, that's Ariza and Toni. It's their first Valentine's Day together."

"Oh, that's nice," Ivor said, glancing over at the couple. Ariza was leaning over and giving Toni a little kiss on the cheek. "Are you sure it's only their first Valentine's Day? They look like they've known each other for years."

"I'm fairly certain, since they started dating two weeks before today."

"What! Really?!" Gabriel finally got over his embarrassment when it changed into surprise, the warrior staring in confusion at the couple, who were now talking and gesturing with their hands as they grinned at each other. "They look like they've been dating for three years at least."

"They've known each other for two. Well-" Radar paused, squinting a bit as he reconsidered that. "Almost two, I think."

Ellegaard shook her head as Magnus finally regained control of himself and climbed back into the booth. "You really wouldn't be able to tell just by looking at them."

"You really wouldn't."

"You've been over here a while," Stella suddenly noted as she slipped an arm around Jessi's shoulders. This was not a hard feat in itself because Jessi was a good deal shorter than the other woman.

Jessi grinned at Stella. "Aw, I knew you'd miss me."

"No, I just wanted to give the meeting a more solid conclusion." Stella would've been slightly more convincing if a light blush had not made its way across her face.

Jessi's grin widened. "Aw, you're better than a forty-five degree angle, Stella. You're acute-y."

Stella's blush deepened, hazel eyes widening. "Oh no."

"Oh yes. Roses are red, violets are blue, there's nothing in the world prettier than you," Jessi continued, her grin simply remaining on her face.

"Roses are red, my face is too, that only happens when I'm around you," Stella countered, her face simply growing redder by the minute as she shot Jessi a light glare and smile.

Jessi froze stock still at that, her eyes widening as she slowly turned to look at Stella more clearly.

Ivor gave a dramatic sigh. "Oh dear."

Stella glanced at the older man in confusion as Ivor continued, a little overdramatically, "I do believe Stella here has made a fatal mistake."

"I believe so too, Ivor," Jesse sighed, in mock disappointment as he leaned his cheek on his hand and regarding Stella with a mock-sad expression on his face. "Too bad, I was starting to like her, too."

"What? What do you mean?" Stella asked, a little uncomfortably.

"Don't you know?" Harper asked curiously, shaking her own head in mock disappointment at the younger woman.

Jessi was starting to grin again, but this time there was a wickedly mischievous light glowing in her eyes.

"Never try to out-pun the pun master," Ivor, Jesse, and Harper chorused in perfect unison.

"I'm gonna start following you around," Jessi said pleasantly, with that wicked light still glowing in her eyes, "since my dad always said to follow my dreams."

Stella simultaneously blushed harder and paled, if that was possible. "Oh _no_ ," she repeated.

"Roses are red, violets are blue," Jessi spoke, now in a sing-song as she steered the leader of Champion City towards a nearby booth, Lluna obediently trotting after them, "I didn't know what perfect was 'til I met you."

"RIP Stella," Magnus sighed, shaking his head sympathetically with a huge grin, "killed by Jessi's awful...ly good puns. You will be missed."

Ellegaard rolled her eyes at the man next to her. "Of course you think her puns are good."

"Hey, Ariza, why'd you give me 11 real roses and one fake one?"

Everyone glanced over to see Toni holding a bouquet and tilting it from side to side curiously. There were eleven red roses in there, but there was also one rose that was clearly fake. (I mean it was a lovely flower, but it was very much fake.)

"Because it's a sign. I will stop loving you when all the roses wilt," Ariza said innocently, giving Toni a smile so warm that they could feel the heat of it from across the room.

Toni blinked at the comment, before it grew into a warm grin. "Thanks, cracker."

"No problem, Tonibear."

"You two are so sweet you're going to give everyone in this room cavities!" Aiden called over to the two of them, grinning teasingly, since now everyone was watching the couple.

"You, Ivor, and... sort of Romeo are like Sour Patch Kids. First you're sour, then you're sweet," Ariza retaliated easily, even as a pink blush crept across her face and she took Toni's hand.

"Ooh, yeah. They kinda look like 'em too, if you squint," Cassie agreed cheerfully.

Romeo turned redder than his hair from where he was sitting near Xara in one of the very corners of the room, while everyone at the Order's table began to giggle and Aiden squinted at Cassie teasingly.

Binta had been sitting by herself with a book and a coffee, but she now stood up and backed herself up as far as she could, the camera in her hands encompassing everyone who was currently in the room.

She snapped the shot quickly and watched as it developed. Romeo and Xara were sitting in the far corner, talking to each other with Waffles seated on Xara's lap. Romeo now had a huge blush on his face as well, but that was fine. Xara was smirking at him.

Then there was Hadrian and Mevia, a few seats away from them. Mevia was leaning back in her chair and talking to him with a cup of tea in her hands, while Hadrian looked almost bored but was at least paying attention to her talking. Almost immediately there was Stella, Jessi, and Lluna, Lluna almost grinning while Stella was the shade of an overripe tomato and Jessi was grinning teasingly in her purple overalls and red-sleeved-t-shirt and the heart pin.

And then there was Jesse and Nell, Jesse looking as if he was on the verge of bursting into giggles while Nell was just grinning broadly, not even bothering to hide it. Her green-and-gray tank top was the same as usual.

Now a blushing Soren and still-slightly-pink Gabriel were grinning at Ivor as he rolled his eyes at them, Harper covering her mouth with one hand to muffle her own giggles. Magnus had his bald head back and was laughing openly with one arm around Ellegaard.

On the other side of the room, Lukas and Petra were cheerfully talking about something, with Petra stifling laughter and Lukas waving his hands animatedly, although there was a huge grin on his face at the Sour Patch Kids comment. Then developed Maya and Gill, who were sneaking back into the room and looking like they'd been a pair of teenagers ruffling each other up, and then Aiden and Cassie, with Aiden teasingly reaching over and ruffling the redhead's hair in a friendly way.

And now there was Milo and Isa, having a slightly awkward conversation but smiling at each other pleasantly, and then Axel and Olivia showed up, with Axel holding up some TNT and Olivia frantically trying to get him to put it away, and finally in the foreground- since Binta was sitting just behind them- was Ariza and Toni, holding hands and looking for all purposes like they'd been in a relationship for at least three years.

She set the Polaroid on the table and, pulling out a marker that had been in her pocket, scribbled a caption on the bottom of the picture.

 _Happy Valentine's Day! - 2018_

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 **A/N: Might start doing a holiday special book. What do you guys think?**

 **Most of the ships that are in this are HIGHLY ambiguous. Ivor and Harper are the only really 'confirmed' ship in this, while everyone else can sort of be implied together if you want. If you don't ship anything in this, it can be taken as friendship. (Binta just came with Radar so he can hide from the crazy fangirls/OCs (cough) that are shipped with him.)**

 **Except for me and Toni, that's confirmed. xD**

 **Ah, also, I don't ship Soren or Gabriel. xD**

 **Happy Valentine's Day!**

 **x.X. A.L. X.x**


End file.
